


right here, with me

by Sasskarian



Series: A Song of Sea and Stars [1]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Angst, Grief/Mourning, Post-Mass Effect 1, Pre-Mass Effect 2, Shakarian - Freeform, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-11
Updated: 2017-01-11
Packaged: 2018-09-16 22:07:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9291572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sasskarian/pseuds/Sasskarian
Summary: There's a hot, tight knot in his chest and she's pressed so close, he thinks he could count each faint freckle on her face.They look like tiny stars.…there are twenty-eight on her right cheek. Thirty on her left. And fourteen, right across the bridge of her nose.Those are his favorite. They remind him of his own markings.





	

The first time Garrus notices it, the Alliance brass is meeting.

Hackett and Anderson brought them all together to discuss Shepard's plan, and her progress. According to the battle board in the CIC—  something he'd helped her put together, talking shop and cases and missions compared to dossiers—  they had already cleared out Feros and Virmire, leaving a trail of geth pieces and one Alliance body behind them.

Their next planned stop is Noveria.

_(He knows she is not okay. He’s come to read her tells easily. A sigh in the shuttle; the lack of blaring, tinny music in the Mako; no longer stripping off her armor with everyone else.)_

And everyone seems to want a piece of Shepard.

_(“That’s the price of being good at your job, Io,” Hannah says seriously. “You’re the only female N7 officer in the fleet right now and it’s getting you a lot of attention.”)_

Her mother is there, having taken a few hours away from the  _SS Kilimanjaro_  to stand by her daughter; Garrus finds himself fascinated at how the two women match up to each other. Similar red-brown hair, the same gray Shepard eyes, the same faint smattering of freckles. When they stand next to each other, Iolana is taller than her mother, but their shoulders square off the same way when approached by a higher-up; the rest of the time, their weight shifts foot to foot in a way that would have been called restless on anyone else.

Age has softened Hannah Shepard just slightly, put something that whispered  _kindness_ in her face, but there’s no denying the familial connection. And Shepard—  his Shepard, anyway—  carries a hardness to her eyes that her mother doesn't; it hadn't been there quite as often when he'd first met her.

_(Her eyes went steely after Virmire, and more than once, Garrus has woken for his shift to find her standing at Alenko's station, knuckles white with gripping the bench, breathing too slowly and evenly to be natural.)_

As the two women talk between themselves and to their respective Admirals, Garrus catches a strange scent—  something musky, something that in a turian would speak of  _wanting_  — more than once. He hasn't been able to pinpoint it, has little experience trying to read humans by the chemical markers their emotions left in the air, but every so often, it’s there. It makes sense, in an abstract sort of way, if he’s right about what it means. He knows, on some level, that Shepard is considered at least marginally attractive by human standards, but… he doubts it’s only that.

There’s a  _magnetism_  to Shepard.

When she walks into a room, few don't notice. She turns heads not by value of aesthetic attractiveness but by the value of the fires she finds herself in. Attaining an N7 rank had put her on the galactic eligibility map for many. Surviving—  and even thriving—  during the Skyllian Blitz had fanned the flames of her legend. The strength of her back and the long list of fights physical and metaphorical she had already survived were kindling in her bonfire. Becoming the first human Spectre has caused more than a few people to throw themselves at her.

_(She pulls him along quickly, ducking her head to hide behind his cowl. Puzzled, he does his best to shield her from view. “That’s Conrad Verner,” she mutters, a block down the Ward. “He’s got—notions.”)_

And he had suspected, correctly, that hunting Saren would only bring more attention her way.

It wasn't unusual, by turian standards, to be attracted to someone who's done great deeds; it was a common theme in turian media, in fact. In an established meritocracy like the Hierarchy, well-respected soldiers or generals might gain several proposals over the course of their career; sometimes, even their marital status wasn't a deterrent, despite turians generally being a species who mated for life. Very few of those offers were taken up, but it wasn't entirely unheard of.

Not that… _he_ thinks of Shepard like that.

It’s a matter of respect, he tells himself, and has tried for months to ignore the little hook of jealousy that twisted in his gizzard.

Shepard doesn't belong to anyone but herself. He shouldn't change that.

He wouldn't.

_(But part of him wants to try.)_

***

After they bring Saren down—  and if that wasn't the saddest thing he'd ever seen, Garrus thought—  that sense of  _want_  becomes almost pervasive. Garrus can barely walk into a room with her without seeing her shoulders tense, fingers clenching into fists; the sheer musky scent of greed and need choked him, cloying and heavy. Even with her weak human nose, he knows she can tell just how she’s coveted.

_(She shivers and rubs her arms. “Makes my skin crawl, the way they look at me, sometimes,” she snarls, baring her teeth at a nearby reporter. The next day, the image of her snarl is all over the holonews.)_

Shepard is no longer just Shepard, no longer just the Hero of Elysium, no longer  _just_  anything. She is now Shepard, Alliance Ideal.

Shepard, Savior of the Citadel.

Shepard, Shepard,  _Shepard_.

Her name has become an oath, a promise, her face a beacon of hope. Her image is the whip that the Alliance uses to push citizens to do more and be more.

Even her friends aren't immune to it.

_(He wonders if they ever had been, really. She had dragged them all to greatness, meaning to or not.)_

Anderson sometimes looks sideways at her, as if he can't quite believe she’s there. Garrus—so used to reading human faces now—can see the affection: fatherly, proud, sometimes disbelieving. Tali adores Shepard and always has, but there are times when the hero worship gets out of control. Liara still blushed every time Shepard looks at her, and Garrus vividly remembers the way Kaidan found any excuse to be around her.

_(In them, Garrus saw what his first few interactions with Shepard must have been, a young, brash cop swallowed up by the legend of Commander Shepard—  and he flushes with shame. How could he not have seen the unease in her face?)_

In turn, Shepard spent more and more time with him and Wrex, even after he returned to work. It isn't unusual for Wrex to come ambling up to C-Sec to see Garrus—  and, Garrus suspected, scare the pants off of some of the rookies; there is little more frightening for a rookie than a large, battle-scarred krogan leering out of the shadows at you—  even though he was rumbling about returning to Tuchanka. Shepard had, in some way, rubbed off on him.

_(Their long debates in the cargo hold about the genophage were legendary, and a warning at times that even a krogan wasn't always a match for a small, determined human.)_

And it seems uncanny timing that, after a visit from Wrex, (perhaps a few hours or perhaps a day, but no more than two) his omni-tool would ping with that singular tone he'd set just for Shepard. He occasionally wondered if it was planned, or if the universe was being too kind.

_G, think you can spare an hour? –S_

_S, for you, I think I might even have two. –G_

_Smartass. -S_

_You like me that way. -G_

_(He wonders, grinning down at the message, if it is because the two of them don’t put her on a pedestal.)_

***

They never call it shore leave.

Even if the Normandy is operating with a skeleton crew after she'd scheduled each of them a few hours station-side, even when Pressly gives her that small, knowing smile, even when Joker tries to yell the words out the airlock before Ash yanks his hat over his eyes. Shepard never allows the words "shore leave" to be spoken aloud. After Elysium, she considers, however improbably, that those words might just be forever cursed for a Shepard.

So it’s never shore leave. Refueling stop. Council meeting. Prearranged offloading of personnel. Anything but shore leave.

"Shepard!"

Shepard steps into the C-Sec office wing, hiding a smile as an almost-eight-foot Krogan barrels towards her. Wrex wraps his hands around her shoulders and very nearly picks her up before crushing her to his chest plate with a dull armor-on-armor clang. They stay that way for a moment, the krogan's claws probably making a mess of her armor's paint job.

She finds she doesn’t care all that much.

"All right, you beast, let her breathe," a flanging rumble comes from behind them, full of wry amusement, and her heart settles in her chest.

Wrex barks out a laugh—  it reverberates against the top of her head—  and turns to face Garrus with the krogan equivalent of what she could only deem a shit-eating grin on his face. "Jealous, turian? She came to me first."

"Hardly," Garrus scoffs, pulling her in for his own embrace. "I can't blame her for your barbarity." His fingers settle naturally at her hips, welcome and warm and so _familiar_ ; there’s a slight rumbling under his words and she presses herself a little tighter against his chest. His mandible presses against the top of her head, something softening in his posture.

On the Normandy, he'd smelled of gun oil, of the dry heat of a desert and the tiniest edge of solvent, and that was the smell she was still used to, the one that grounded her in the mako, in the cargo bay. Here, though, he smells like fabric cleanser and the dry air of the Citadel and something warm and spicy, probably kavah. Both are him; both are home. Her hands close around his shoulders, the movement bringing something metallic but not unpleasant in with the other melody of scents.

Under her hands, Garrus stills for a moment, before his arms close around her shoulders to bring her even closer; his subharmonics dip into a lower range that vibrates through his chest and into hers. It seems to get inside her bones, into the empty spaces and battle scars that ache the most, and soothes. It sounds like safety, comfort, and home.

Shepard closes her eyes and lets the noise of C-Sec melt away.

It’s been so long since she'd been able to feel comfortable with someone.

***

"There's something you're not telling me," Garrus says quietly, his hand wrapped loosely around his drink. They watch Wrex laughing uproariously at the bar, apparently trying to persuade the bartender to give him a shot of ryncol for Shepard.

_(“Just a small one!” Wrex shouts, glee etched across his scarred face. “She can handle it!”)_

_(“Sir, you should know that Ryncol affects humans badly. I’ll need you to sign a waiver if you insist on this course of action. I’m not losing my license over a poisoned human!”)_

"There's a lot I'm not telling you, Vakarian," she replies easily, leaning back in the lounge and crossing her ankles on his knee; his hand drops to one, thumb idly stroking the bone there. If he hadn't spent all those months with her, he might have believed the calm facade she projects. "You don't work for me anymore, remember?"

Garrus sighs, squeezing gently. "Shepard, I know you better than that," he reminds her. "We spent months practically living in each other’s' pockets." 

_(Her scent carries fatigue and despair and more than a hint of anger, an all too-common emotional maelstrom, after Virmire.)_

She’s silent for a moment, looking past their surroundings at something he couldn’t see.

"It's... I'm so tired, Garrus," she whispers, the facade cracking slightly. "All that work to bring the Reapers to light, to find Saren. To protect people. To warn them."

Her expression doesn't change when he takes her hand, but her fingers clamp down on his just shy of hurting.

_(This used to be awkward, five fingers sliding into three. When did it become comfortable? When did it change?)_

_(Probably after Virmire, like everything else.)_

"And it's all useless," Shepard growls, brows beetling. She takes a hit off her drink, something poisonously green and sweet-smelling. "I did my job and they want me to be done with it, now. I'm not preparing for Reapers or even cleaning up Saren's mess anymore. I'm supposed to stop making a fuss and go along with the Council's little story that the threat's over."

"What?" Garrus can’t help but stare. He's heard few reports so far about Sovereign, but he'd attributed that to his newly declassified status. Or something. "They're denying the whole thing?"

Shepard raises an eyebrow at him over the rim of her glass.

"That's— " Garrus couldn't think. He'd known the Council didn't have the quads to admit to everything but to pretend that there was _no_ bigger threat? That they had wasted eight months of their lives chasing a single man and a small army?

"Awful? Horrible? Yeah," she tilts her head up, staring at the ceiling. A stray beam of light from the strobe passes over her face and Garrus sees the hollows of her cheeks darken, a flash of light on her throat. He can almost see the beat of her heart.

For a moment, he can't look away.

"There's more."

He groans. "Isn't there always?"

***

Geth.

Garrus snarls, slamming his fist on the desk again in a vicious sort of pleasure at the knuckle-marks in the flimsy plastic. There are others scarring its surface, past cases, past failures. He’s tempted to throw every datapad off of the thing in a fit of anger, but takes a deep breath, thumbs pressing hard on his brow plates. He's too old for a temper tantrum, even if it would make some part of him feel better.

 _They're wasting_  Commander Shepard  _hunting down pockets of_  geth.

It’s been a week since Shepard had stopped by, had told him. A week since he'd seen the hollow of her throat, felt her ankles crossed trustingly in his lap.

_(If he concentrates, he could still feel the fine bones of her feet under his hands. It’s burned into his memory, makes his fingers tremble.)_

A week since he'd seen her choke down that ryncol shot with Wrex amidst the cheering of the bar.

_(Wrex had laughed and laughed, proclaiming her loudly to be an honorary krogan to the bartender. She shot back that it didn't mean anything in front of non-krogan. She pales as the ryncol hits her stomach, gasps, but then grins over her shoulder at Garrus.)_

A week since he'd had her in his arms.

_(Garrus thinks he might have liked it too much. He can still smell her scent, very faintly, on that shirt. He tries to pretend he's held off washing it for practical reasons.)_

_(Turians aren't good liars.)_  

***

**Two weeks**

***

He comms Shepard once, briefly. It was the middle of the night cycle on the Normandy, and he takes a strange sort of pleasure that she didn't bother putting her hair back or answering with voice-only, even though he'd interrupted her rest.

Shepard had always been a tiny bit vain when it comes to appearing in control and unflappable, but with him, she’s long since stopped bothering.

_(He feels a little guilty for the exorbitant cost of an FTL comm as he drinks her in, but the smile that lights up her face at his first smart-ass comment erases it.)_

Their call is short, nothing but small talk. But her eyes stayed locked on his, and the slow, pleased curl of her smile puts some warmth into his veins.

_Pressly bought Tali some dextro-chocolate for her anniversary on the Normandy. It was the cutest thing._

_I had a great case the other day. Can you believe that crazy hanar preacher tried to steal a model of a Prothean beacon?_

_Joker might have an arrest warrant in the Apien Crest. Ash says I need to smooth some feathers._

_Ha, ha, Shepard. Your bird jokes never get old._

_Smartass. You're lucky I like you._

Underneath their banter, he’s sure she feels what he isn't saying.

 _(Stay safe. Stay sane. I miss you.)_  

***

**Four weeks**

***

Four weeks since the bar. Two since their call.

_(But who's counting?)_

"Vakarian."

"Chellick."

_(He is.)_

"Everything okay? I can let you take a break on cases for a while."

Garrus breathes in, deep. Debates.

Breathes out.

"No, sir. I'm fine."

_(But is she?)_

He turns, retreating back to his desk, missing the thoughtful look Chellick gave him. 

***

**Six weeks**

***

**_Ping._ **

Garrus sits up in the darkness, sheet pooling around his waist.

The apartment—  small, cluttered, out of the way in one of the lowest Wards on the Citadel—  is quiet and peaceful around him. His Kessler pistol lies in his holster, his visor still blinking gently in standby. It's been six weeks since Shepard has been to the office and he doesn’t know why, but he was dreaming about her.

**_Ping._ **

Relaxing a fraction, he slides his omni-tool back on his wrist and punches up the message VI. The smile he'd felt begin when he heard Shepard's message tone fades as he read.

_G, are you awake? I need you.–S_

_Please._

He doesn't bother tapping a reply but calls her link, frantically searching on the floor for the pants he'd pulled off two hours ago.

"Shepard, what's wrong? Where are you?" There's a growl in his voice, subvocals laced with fear and worry, but he can’t control it. He trips once, pulling on the left leg of his pants with a curse, and doesn't breathe until she answers.

"I—  I'm in—  I'm at the—  the docks." Her voice is tight and he can hear—  tears? Panic? Fear? He’s tired and the connection is wavering too much for him to get a solid read on her. "I'm sorry, I forgot it was probably your night cycle. I'm sorry. I can go back to the Nor— "

"If you think you are getting back on that warship right now, you're  _delusional_ ," he hisses, stuffing his arm haphazardly into a jacket he doesn't bother cinching; let him scandalize the patrols at the dock. He’s got more important things to worry about. "I've got your six, Shepard. I’m on my way.  _Stay put_."

***

Iolana Shepard has never looked small.

Not to Garrus, anyway. Logically, he knows she is. Shorter than an average human female, built of solid muscle. Tougher than most people he'd known.

_("That's the commander, all right," Kaidan laughs quietly in his memory the night before Virmire. "Tougher than old boot leather and twice as likely to bite you.")_

But she has never  _looked small_  to him.

_(That she does now scares him. Infuriates him.)_

When he reaches her, he doesn't hesitate in pulling her against his chest, talons sinking into her hair. Her hands wrap around his back and she shudders against him, swaying.

_(She smells like sorrow and rage and pain. He growls under his breath and wonders whose life he's ending for putting this broken look in her eyes.)_

"I'm— " she chokes, wiping at her face.

"If you say you're sorry, Shepard, I cannot be held responsible for my actions," Garrus counters, cutting her off before the crying gets out of control. "What do you need?"

"Just you." Her reply is muffled against his bare hide.  

***

In the end, he takes her back to his apartment.

_(When she stumbles getting out of the skycar, he gives up and tugs her against his side, keeping her upright. He tries not to think about how she feels, covered by his arm, burrowed safely against his skin.)_

_(He fails.)_

Garrus sat Shepard on his couch, pressing a mug into her hands and opening a few cupboards. He's grateful that—  somewhere, in this mess—  he keeps a very small stash of levo-friendly coffee in his pitiful kitchen; he thinks it might have been from having Doctor Michel over once but he can't really remember.

Every second and third thought in his head is wrapped around the pale, shaking woman on his couch and he curses when his talons rip the small bag.

_(The smell comforts him. She smells like this, sometimes.)_

"God, Vakarian," she coughs after the first sip, some color coming back into her face. "What did you _do_ to this?"

"Sorry," he murmurs, one talon helplessly brushing a strand of hair behind her ear. "I'm not a very good cook on the best of days. Best friend emergencies tend to make it worse."

Shepard gives him a small, sad smile and he sits on the chair he dragged across the room earlier. His feet bracket hers and she stares back down into the coffee before she starts to talk. They've sat like this dozens—  hundreds—  of times on the Normandy, feet or hands or shoulders touching, grounding. 

"We docked a couple of hours ago," she begins. Garrus tries to ignore the tiny stab of pain in his heart, but she sees it anyway and grabs for his hand blindly.

_(That she didn't tell him she was coming hurts. He'd have taken the day off, cleaned the apartment, something.)_

"We're going deep hunting in the Traverse at the end of the week and then we'll drop Tali back at the Flotilla, but we were low on dextro rations. There's that one shop on Zakera that sells the good ones and I wanted to surprise— " Shepard cuts herself off. Her eyes flick up and she flushes, face screwing up against the tears that she can’t stop without letting go of his hand.

There’s a whine to her voice he doesn’t think she’s aware of. It sounds like keening.

"I was," she whispers after a moment. "I was going to comm you in the morning, since Normandy's night cycle had synced with the Citadel's. I thought you'd need your sleep and I didn't want to be... greedy."

_(He knows that's probably true in her mind, but thinks that she can be greedy with him any time she wants. He hungers to be near her.)_

Garrus keeps looking at her, taking in the dark skin under her eyes, the deep furrow in her brow.

"I wanted to see you before I left but I couldn't—  I had—  I saw— "

The pieces click and he wants to swear, wants to hide her away and protect her,  _wants_.

_(His heart stutters, crumples in his chest, aches. The bruise he carries pales in comparison to hers.)_

"You had another nightmare, didn't you," he sighs, a statement rather than a question. He’d found out the truth about her odd sleeping schedule after Kaidan had died. It hardly failed. She would sleep two hours, maybe three, and then be up, all restless energy and tired eyes. And if she wasn’t in the cockpit with Joker, she was down in the armory with him.

_(Her hands work steadily beside his, black up to the second knuckle with oil. Sometimes, her hip will brush him and there’s a guiltily-happy thrum in the back of his throat. They need nothing more than this. Work and peace and comfortable silence.)_

"Virmire," she confirms, knuckles going white around the mug. "He died to stop Saren and the Reapers and they're sending me after  _geth_." She moves as if to stand but then sinks back into the cushion, staring at the play of lights on his ceiling. Exhaustion is written into every line of her body.

Her voice is broken when she whispers, “How can I be the savior of the galaxy if no one will even listen to me?”

Garrus says nothing, even when she pulls her fingers out of his.

"I need— " Shepard's hand finds its way into her hair, pulling viciously. "I feel so lost."

Slowly, Garrus edges himself onto the couch beside her. He takes the mug from her and sets it to the side before pulling her across his legs, gently, careful of his spurs. Shepard's body is trembling and her muscles are stiff enough, he thinks they'd snap if she moved too fast. 

"No," he whispers into her hair. "You’re right here, with me."

 _(When she closes her eyes and leans into his chest, he feels like he can finally breathe again.)_  

***

 An hour after Shepard's tears have slowed, Garrus gathers her into his arms and makes his way to his bed on numb legs.

_(He counts it a miracle he hasn't dropped her or broken something.)_

Her eyes flutter when he lays next to her, on top of the sheet, carefully not touching her. He's tired and his eyes are heavy and one misplaced talon could end up making her regret coming here.

_(How many times has this thought crossed his mind? Shepard leaning into him, not looking for saving, but simply support. How many times had he lain awake in his cot after they’d talked, trying to place these emotions?)_

He's just on the edge of sleep when he feels a small, cool hand on his mandible.

_(He opens his eyes and he's shocked how this feels, looking into her face. He hazily notices that up close, her eyes are thulium-gray. There's a hot, tight knot in his chest and she's pressed so close, he thinks he could count each faint freckle on her face.)_

_(They look like tiny stars.)_

_(…there are twenty-eight on her right cheek. Thirty on her left. And fourteen, right across the bridge of her nose.)_

_(Those are his favorite. They remind him of his own markings.)_

"...he blamed me," Shepard whispers, curling into him, shaking. "In the dream. Said I wasted his sacrifice to play pony for the Council."

"Never." He isn’t sure what playing pony is, but he can hear the bitterness in her voice; some things, he doesn’t need a translator for. Garrus slides his hand up her back, feeling her fight for each breath; he does the only thing he can think of to ease her pain, and pulls her closer, tucking her under his chin. She shakes in his arms, and he brushes his mouth over her forehead in a clumsy imitation of a comforting kiss. "Kaidan would never blame you, Shepard. He adored you."

Her skin feels warm under the plates of his mouth. When he brushes against her temple, her fingers slide behind his jaw, blunt nails pressing into his scale. He can't help the growl rumbling through his chest and her head comes up slightly, meeting his gaze. Her eyes glint and she slips one hand down his waist, a small smile forming when she hears his ragged breath.

_(She presses her lips to his mouth and he freezes. Shudders. He's seen this in human vids but isn't sure what to do.)_

_(Two and a half minutes later, with her tongue brushing his and the taste of burnt coffee and Shepard in his mouth and the feel of his fingers digging into her waist as she gasps, he thinks maybe that's okay.)_  

***

It doesn't go farther.

He can smell her want— sweet and heady, musky, the same scent he’d caught all those months ago—  can feel it in the way she arches against him, the way she tries to bite him when his talons trace her spine over and over; he's fascinated by the way her pale skin reddens in thin, warm lines and the faint shadows of her vertebrae in the artificial light outside his window. The way she kisses him spells her want out in a different language, shaking hands and muttered curses and his name like a forgotten prayer on her lips.

 _(He'll never forget that sound, he knows, his tongue flat against her pulse. His name, his name,_ his name _.)_

But he won't take advantage of her pain. She came to him for safety and he will keep her safe. That means protecting her even from herself.

And from him.

_(He tucks her against his side, shaking, thinks reckless thoughts. Telling Chellick he's quitting, returning to the Normandy, seeing where this goes. Shepard and Vakarian, always.)_

When she drifts into sleep, a smile ghosts across her lips and she sighs his name. He follows it with another kiss, and another, until the weight of his eyes forces him to sleep, finally. 

***

 He wakes alone. That isn't as much of a surprise—or a hurt—as he thought it would be.

 _(He can smell her on his sheets. He can smell_ them  _on his sheets.)_

_(His shower is extra cold that morning.)_

There's a small scrap of paper on his desk when he arrives for his shift at C-Sec. One side has a short note, scribbled in her terrible, spiky writing:  _G, see you in a few weeks. Love, S._ It smells faintly of Shepard and has a strange, double-loop-and-sharp-point symbol on the other side that his translator doesn't compute, but he smiles anyway and tucks it into his pocket. 

***

**Eleven weeks**

***

Garrus thinks about comming her again, just to hear her voice. His latest case is sucking all the life out of him.

( _The edges of the paper in his pocket have gone fuzzy from his fingers touching it.)_

It shouldn't have been his, really, he's not on Vice, but Vice is full and there are always too many drug dealers for one squad to handle anyway.

_(“Garrus, why do you have a heart on your desk?” Bailey grins at him across the hall, eyes mischievous. “Got a girlfriend?”)_

This was his father’s solution, Garrus knows. Throwing himself into work, into case after case. It almost doesn’t bother him anymore, now that he knows what it feels like to be haunted by something.

 _(Garrus doesn’t answer Bailey, but he carries the paper anyway.)_  

***

  **Thirteen weeks**

***

There's a commotion outside his office, the loud buzz of an angry turian, but Garrus is up to his mandibles in this stupid drug case that keeps fizzling out on him and he doesn’t care. He doesn’t have the energy to care about office drama.

_(The next time Chellick wants him to take over from Vice, Garrus is going to remind him this isn't his area. Too much red tape in Vice.)_

"Officer Vakarian."

_(Maybe he’ll remind Chellick he’s a bad turian. Allergic to red tape. And stupidity.)_

“Vakarian?”

Bleary, he looks up to see David Anderson in his doorway. Garrus shoots to his feet and snaps out a crisp Alliance salute before remembering he's back in C-Sec and not on the Normandy.

"Sir, welcome?" His brain is scrambled, but Garrus gestures to the chair in front of his desk. “What can I do for you?”

Anderson sighs, the lines in his craggy face deeper than Garrus has ever seen before. When Anderson removes his cap and tucks it under his arm, a shiver of cold dread washes over him.

_(There are few good reasons for an Alliance Captain to look like this. Garrus walks stiffly, mandibles drawn tight to his face with anxiety.)_

"Sit down, son.” The captain’s voice is gentle and Garrus feels the floor shift under his feet; he's heard that tone of voice before. “I have some news we should talk about." 

***

**Thirteen weeks and one day**

***

Garrus packs that night. A datapad, his omni-tool, his visor.

_(The taste of burnt coffee— )_

Thermal clips. The Kessler. His father’s old Mantis.

_(— and Shepard— )_

His fingers tremble on the worn paper, debating whether he wants the painful reminder that she would not, in fact, see him in a few weeks. 

_(Twenty-eight. Thirty. Fourteen.)_

One omni-call to Barla Von later and he never sleeps in that bed again.

***

**Thirteen weeks and four days**

***

The shuttle to Omega is cramped and filthy. Garrus finds he doesn’t mind.

_(Stale sweat and the smell of multiple species in a small space almost—almost—drowns out the sweetness of Shepard’s skin)_

His omni-tool pings twice, a sad, quiet sound. He wonders vaguely if he should charge it.

_Vakarian,_

_Have you seen the news reels? I don’t believe this Alliance bullshit. Shepard was better than this._

_I want to hear it from someone I trust before I have to get answers with my shotgun._

_-Wrex_

Garrus closes the message.

Normally, he’d feel worried that Wrex might actually follow through on his threat. Seems like she was always the leash holding back that krogan rage.

_(“Wrex, when I said be a scary krogan, I didn’t mean heatbutt him!” she shouts, but there’s a suspicious twist of her lips that tells Garrus she’s trying very hard to not be amused. "I need him conscious or he can't answer questions!" Wrex just shrugs and laughs, booming out through the armory.)_

Now?

Now, he just doesn’t feel anything. 

***

**Eighteen weeks**

***

**_Ping-ing._ **

_Garrus,_

_Wrex went to see you and Chellick said you’d resigned very suddenly. He followed your trail off of the Citadel but it’s like you just vanished._

_Don’t do anything rash. Please._

_She wouldn’t want that for you._

_-Liara_

Garrus looks at Sidonis, standing in the doorway with a large brute of a man.

He doesn’t have time for Liara’s concern right now. He has a job in front of him, the beginnings of a team, and all he wants is Shepard.

 _(Shepard can’t want anything anymore.)_  

***

**Twenty-six weeks**

***

There is a name ghosting around Omega. It floats in hushed whispers and angry shouts, in fevered prayers and dark, dangerous alleys.

_Archangel._

Sidonis laughs the first time he seems the emblem hurriedly painted on a wall. Two long lines and a bird of some sort, fresh enough for the paint to smear against his fingers.

Butler laughs with Sidonis, the two of them leaning on each other as they snicker.

_(She’d laugh, too. Her fingers would brush his and there’d be that little smirk he loved, but her eyes would shine like they did when he stepped away from Saleon.)_

_(Two weeks later, the four members of his crew are sporting a cleaned-up version of the symbol on their arms. “If we’re gonna make a name for ourselves,” Butler laughs, “we might as well do it all the way proper.”)_

For the first time since coming to Omega, Garrus feels the barest hint of something. He thinks it might be pride. 

***

**Twenty-eight weeks**

***

There are three unread messages on his dying omni-tool.

_Tali’Zorah: Garrus_

_Castis Vakarian: Where are you?_

_Solana: Dad’s furious; so am I_

Garrus keeps letting it die, but suspects Sensat and Weaver keep charging it for him. He hasn’t missed the looks they give him when they think he’s not looking. Even Sidonis rumbles with concern every time they pass an Alliance recruiting holo with her face on it.

_(Remember the Sacrifice! the holo shouts at him. Her eyes are cool and even. They look dead. They don’t look like Shepard at all.)_

The first time, he flinches away from it, eyes blind. Sidonis wraps an unobtrusive arm around him and guides him away, not saying anything even after Garrus’ breathing has returned to normal. For once in his pathetic life, Garrus is glad that no one comments on his reaction.

 _(He remembers her. He_ remembers  _her. Her quick hands, the unapologetic, unflinching joy in her voice when she used her biotics. The way she looked at him, that first day, standing on the steps of the Tower.)_

The second time, he’s able to not look at it helplessly; still, Sensat murmurs something to Weaver and there’s the unforgettable smell of burnt screens as they pass. He’s grateful that he doesn’t have to see the mockery they made of her because of his team’s small kindnesses.

 _(The way she looked, hair spread across his pillows, throat bared so trustingly. Her leg resting between his, the way he can feel her chest rising and falling beneath him. Warm and safe and_ his)

For the next three weeks, he doesn’t see anything but dark, blank screens around Omega when they prowl. When Aria rouses herself enough to get them fixed, the recruitment ad has changed into a composite human face.

_(Join the Alliance! the holos say, quieter. He suspects there was an angry krogan and a talented quarian technician involved in the abrupt ad change. Maybe even a mourning captain.)_

Garrus is unspeakably relieved. 

***

**Thirty-two weeks**

***

Garrus finally reads the messages. Four more have been added.

_Ops Chief Williams: Garrus?_

_Castis Vakarian: Come Home_

_Anderson: Official KIA Report_

Three am in the night cycle finds him up on the sniper’s perch, sighting old ryncol bottles without shooting. The last message still flickers on the abandoned screen when the artificial morning comes and Erash and Mierin come to relieve him from watch.

_Cp. H. Shepard: Loss_

***

**Fifty-one weeks**

***

Half-asleep, Garrus slaps the comm open without looking at it and recoils when his father’s voice buzzes irritably into his ear.

“You finally decide to answer? Your sister is worried  _sick_  about you, where have you been?”

_(Lost. Alone. Thinking too much about the number fourteen.)_

Garrus chooses not to say anything. Castis sighs, and Garrus can imagine him running a frustrated, weary hand over his crest. When he speaks next, it’s softer, subvocals full of concern.

“Garrus, please. You’ve been so distant. I know we haven’t always… gotten along, but this is unlike you.”

_(All I have are these walls and these scars and the memory of someone I think I loved.)_

“I’m in a bad spot, dad,” he finds himself saying quietly, throat tight; he knows the harmonics in his voice buzz with pain and loss. “I’m… lost.”

“…is this about Shepard?” Castis asks, trying very hard to stay neutral.

_(He smells Melenis pouring coffee. It doesn’t smell like the awful stuff he’d burnt for her, but it’s similar enough that he can close his eyes and feel her lips against his skin. But the stench of Omega doesn't change, and the pain in his chest doesn’t ease.)_

“Maybe.” Garrus sighs. Runs his finger over his visor, where her name is carved. “I don’t know.”

His father hums thoughtfully, then says, “Tell me about her.” 

***

**Eighty-three weeks**

***

There’s a new message on his omni-tool. The screen was cracked in his fight with Garm, but it’s clear enough to let him see the name.

_Joker: New Job_

_G-man!_

_Bout to have a new job. I think you’ll like it. Really like it._

_You just have to tell me where you are._

_-J_

Garrus thinks, briefly, about responding. He and the Normandy’s pilot were never very close, but if anyone can understand the way the mention of her name burns into his soul, it might be Joker. He heard through Sensat that the official report from Anderson that Joker resigned citing emotional distress over the crash of the Normandy.

_(Joker blames himself for her death. An unnamed source gets him the full report—not the official version—where Joker tells Anderson that if he’d left the cockpit sooner, maybe Shepard wouldn’t have had to haul him out. The grief in the pilot’s voice adds to the empty ache Garrus feels in his own chest.)_

Archangel stirs, and reminds Garrus that they have a purpose here. There are eleven people depending on him to keep them alive. Eleven people bearing his symbol, fighting his cause.

_(How many times had he walked up to the CIC, seen her sitting in the co-pilot seat, watching the stars? How many times had he missed telling her how beautiful she was, with nebulae painting her face, her hands, with starlight shining silver on her hair?)_

_(Too many.)_

He deletes the message without another thought and returns to cleaning his rifle. 

***

**Ninety-four weeks**

***

Garrus hisses in pain.

He's been betrayed, and now there’s ten other holes in his heart, lined up neatly next to the ones for Shepard and Kaidan.

_(He feels the heat from the blast. Hears Garm laughing, smells the blood boiling—human, asari, batarian— no one should get used to the smell of burning bodies.)_

_(One of his forearm plates cracks when a piece of metal from the blast hits him. He doesn’t feel it as he crawls to cover, watching his home burn.)_

There’s no time for pain. He slides against the wall, feeling the slight pinch as he takes another stim. He’ll have to ration them—

_(Twenty-eight)_

— or not—

_(Thirty)_

What if he just… quit? Omega didn’t do its job. It didn’t drown her from his mind. It didn’t give him anything but more pain, in the end. The thought of giving up and just letting himself rest has an unhealthy draw to it.

_("I'm so tired, Garrus," she whispers in his memory, face pinched beneath flashing bar lights. He understands now.)_

He's so _tired._

Everything is heavy, and suffocating. He can almost feel Omega's gravity pulling him down, and wishes he could follow it through the stone and out into space. That’s how the report said she died, right? Out in space.

_(He can almost hear her whisper in his ear, that quiet, disappointed voice that worked so well on everyone. “Liara told you this isn’t want I wanted for you,” she breathes. He closes his eyes, breathes in. Smells nothing but the filth of Omega.)_

He thinks about calling his father.

Calling Solana and apologizing again.

_(Fourteen)_

He doesn’t. 

***

**Ninety-six weeks**

***

He’s run out of medi-gel.

He’s run out of stims.

His hands shake and burn, joints swollen from holding the rifle so long.

_(Sorry, Shepard.)_

He’s long since run out of hope.

Maybe he’ll call his father after all. 

***

**Ninety-six weeks and four days**

***

There’s an N7 emblem in his scope. 

_(She laughs when his talon traces her tattoo. A small, careful symbol on her shoulder in red and black.)_

His heart gives a painful thump and he can't seem to catch his breath.  

_(There’s an N7 emblem in his scope, painted on red and black armor he knows as well as his own.)_

He jerks awake from his sniping trance, memories colliding with his father's voice; it takes him a moment to remember calling to say good-bye. 

_(His mouth brushes it and he feels her sigh. “It’s against regs, technically,” she admits, rolling over to face him, her fingers ghosting along his mandible. “Most of the N graduates get one somewhere, but the brass likes to pretend we don’t.”)_

Archangel is listening, carefully picking his next target from the wave of Eclipse mercenaries; they seem jumpier than normal. Garrus Vakarian listens to his father droning in his ear, no longer worried about saying good-bye. He sees the red stripe down her arm, follows it helplessly to the N7 again and again.

_(— the taste of burnt coffee and Shepard in his mouth— )_

“Come on home when you’ve finished target practice.” He watches the woman Charge and slam into another mercenary, her omni-blade a quick, fiery slash. He slides a concussive round into his rifle with shaking fingers, aims for the N7. He has to know. If it's a ghost, a mirage, a fantasy, the shot will do no harm. If it’s her…

_(— the feel of her wrists in his hands, her leg between his— )_

“We can work this all out, Garrus.” The figure turns, sights him on the balcony. Though she'd been wearing a helmet, she rips it off and he can see through the scope a pair of angry, narrowed gray eyes.

_(— the smell of her lingering on his bed— )_

“Don’t worry, dad. The odds just got a lot better,” Archangel breathes, shutting off his comm. He smiles as she throws her middle finger at him, blasting the final merc with her shotgun.

_(A heart—he knows what it is now—drawn in fading red ink, rolled up and slid carefully into the casing of his visor, right under her name—)_

He settles down to wait.

 _(— Shepard— )_  

***

**Ninety-six weeks, four days, one hour**

***

“Shepard.”

Her eyes rove hungrily over his face. Garrus knows he’s too thin, his plates pale from exhaustion and too little food. His hands are shaking, the last of the stim starting to crash his system. But her arms spread and there’s a relieved laugh in her voice when she says his name, and all the weeks after he lost her seem less important than the woman standing in front of him.

_(“Garrus,” she gasps, his tongue tracing her collarbone. She laughs breathlessly, sprawling over his chest.)_

He stares hard at her when she inches closer. Shepard has new scars, on her cheeks and across her forehead. Her hair is shorter, haphazardly cut, like it was done in a hurry, and her eyes are still full of steel and pain.

"You shot me," she says softly, the anger gone from her face.

"Had to get you moving," he whispers, and he knows she can hear what he's not saying. 

_I needed to know it was really you._

She’s practically standing between his knees now, close enough that he can see every freckle. Her fingers twitch against her shotgun like she wants to reach for him, and she slides it into her armor’s clip, stripping off her gloves like she wants to touch him.

_(Twenty-eight. Thirty. Fourteen.)_

Garrus wishes she would. His hands are burning with the need to feel her skin. After a moment, Shepard tells her two squad mates to watch the room in case a new wave of mercs arrives.

_(Funny, he thinks. With Shepard here, looking at him like she's half-starved, he'd almost forgotten that he's in the middle of a war zone.)_

She smiles, slow and unsure, lays a hand on his knee. “Garrus?” she asks, shifting restlessly on her feet.

_(Two sets of shoulders, squared in pride. Two sets of feet, shuffling when no one looks.)_

Garrus shudders, tracing every new scar and mark on her face before he closes his hand over hers. Pulls her closer. He notices that now, under the filth of Omega, there is burnt coffee, the crackling ozone smell of recent biotics, and  _Shepard._

_(“I feel so lost,” she whispers against his chest. His voice is low, vibrating with all the things he wants to tell her.)_

He brushes his brow against hers and breathes deep, afraid to close his eyes. Afraid she’ll disappear again. 

 _(“No,” he says after a minute. “You’re right here, with me.”)_  

**Author's Note:**

> So, this isn't totally canon-compliant. I've stretched out the timeline just a smidge; canon timeline said it was only a month or so after the conclusion of Mass Effect that Shepard died. I've stretched it out to three, just to give it a little more realism with travel times and the like.


End file.
